“The Reviewer’s lot, I want you to know, is not always
a happy one. Not only are there the special reviewerly hardships–the
patient suffering of stale insults to one’s virility; the
divided responsibility to readers and authors; the litter of unwanted
books;...”

August, 1966
by Brigid Brophy, London Magazine

“Stephen Vizinczey has created a modern, Hungarian Cherubino.
By a superb incongruity (but not an unprecedented one, since da
Ponte eventually reached the same continent), the author and his
Cherubino have alike fetched up in Canada....”

2 October, 1966
by Alan Forrest, Sunday Citizen

“...After reading this one, you realise that Vizinczey really
knows and Henry Miller and the rest – even D. H. Lawrence
– only thought they did....”

November 17, 2005LRC unveils the 100 most important
Canadian books ever writtenLRC (Literary Review of Canada) (Toronto)

“Canada’s hundred most important books were unveiled
by the Literary Review of Canada today at Massey College. Says LRC
editor Bronwyn Drainie, “When it was suggested a few months
ago that we should create such a list, it felt like a perfect fit
with our commitment to books as a medium and especially to Canadian
books.”...”

French Reviews

25 May, 2001To Learn How to Live
by Pierre Lepape, Le Monde (France)

“András Vajda reads women the way that Vizinczey makes
love with books: with the same desire to understand through pleasure,
the same opening up of the mind and the heart, the same freedom,
the same lucidity and passion for truth and beauty.”...

A book comes back. Stephen Vizinczey's In Praise
of Older Women is said to have reached five million readers
since its first appearence forty years ago. The depiction of restless,
ever-new approaches to body and soul finds an echo in the fate that
has befallen the title....

“Many books need years to find their public, and even in retrospect
it is sometimes difficult to denote the causes of this protracted
wait for attention. So it is all the more welcome when a publisher’s
persistence and desire to make discoveries lead to success and important
works finally gain...”

“at the basis of eroticism, he places knowledge.
In plain English: I love because I learn; I learn because I love….it
is a catalogue quite different from Don Giovanni’s. In the
latter, obsession with the female is destructive, borders on the
Kingdom of the Shades; in Andràs’s catalogue, everything
is living ardor, inexhaustible fervour.” by Giorgio Montefoschi,
Corriere della Sera

“. . . what emerges from the story is a succinct account of the differences between immaturity and maturity; between love and lust; between fulfillment and mere indulgence in mechanical arousement . . . The writing is measured, pointed and masculine; and at the same time as pliant, whip like, clean and cutting as a rapier.”
– R. A. O'Brien, Kingston Whig-Standard

“The author describes one of the most tragic periods of European history: German occupation, then Russian occupation, the secret police, then bloody uprisings. András lives through all that. What is he to do not to appear bruised, invaded, defeated? And that is the moment when woman appears, as the only refuge, the great consolation, the dispenser of forgetting.”
– Naim Kattan, Liberté (Montreal)

“ . . not a 'frank' book. It is an obsessively
honest book.”
– Paul Gottlieb, The Gazette (Montreal)

“[Vajda's mistresses] are as real as the girl in Auden's poem:
Mortal, guilty, but to me / The entirely beautiful. Evoked with
affection and profound insight into character, they are seen with
irony, that is to say, with intelligence.”
– Kildare Dobbs, Saturday Night (Toronto) (full text
review)

“Cool and distanced, and for that very reason erotic in a
subtle and attractive way: it permits us to use our imagination.
. . . It has a classic tone, recalling both Casanova and Stendhal.”
– Robert Fulford, Saturday Night (Toronto)

“Vizinczey has caught – absolutely – the grim
pantomime that is English Canada's attitude toward sex. . . . gush
of involvement afflicts anyone who reads it . . . It draws on the
same kind of emotion that gives passion to Stendhal's novels. .
. .”
– Michael Bawtree, The Telegram (Toronto)

“It is the ability, to sing a sweetly personal song amid the
raucous maelstrom of bitter public events; to present a sexual saga
as a hymn of praise rather than as a swaggering recital of self
aggrandizement, that . . . lifts this book into a niche of its very
own.”
– David Watmough, The Vancouver Sun

“Let us now praise Stephen V. – for writing a happy
book about sex."
– Arthur Zeldin, The Varsity (University Of Toronto)

“What distinguishes the book . . . is an underlying irony,
and self-mockery . . . an economy, a simplicity and directness which
puts to shame the involved fake-poetical utterances of many writers
. . .” – Tony Emery, Victoria Daily Times

“Even the most hopeful of Stephen Vizinczey's admirers failed
to anticipate the stunningly quick success of his novel,' Robert
Fulford wrote in The Toronto Daily Star, commenting on the fact
that In Praise of Older Women had been a best-seller ever since
its appearance – and that its popularity had coincided with
critical approval. 'Reviews across Canada have been exceptionally
good . . . in most cases the reviewers have been admiring and friendly
– and, sometimes, downright astonished.' ' . . . a fresh breeze
blowing through the thicket of tortured reminiscences which have
lately been our lot. Blessed with an ability to poke fun at himself
and at life around him, he writes without pretentiousness or pomposity
about his adventures in areas which no other Canadian has yet had
the temerity to discuss.' ” – Pierre Berton

“. . a unique book and a much-needed one . . . funny without
being sick, tough without loss of charm, and always honest and frank
and readable. For its appraisal of the sexuality of Canadians alone
it should be read by any of us who still pretend to an interest
in the subject.” – Earle Birney

““In Praise of Older Women is a minor masterpiece of
serious comedy. Its treatment of sex is both honest and funny, without
a trace either of post-Lawrentian portentousness or of the pornographic
snigger.” – Ivon Owen

“I was suspicious of In Praise of Older Women if only because
the novel became a worldwide best-seller. I was wrong. This is true
eroticism, which resides in the discovery of and respect for the
other person, which enriches one's knowledge of oneself.”
– Maurice Nadeau, La Quinzaine littéraire
(Paris)

“It is without doubt the most incredible publishing adventure
of recent years . . . In France, [In Praise of Older Women] Éloge
des femmes mûres has now been riding high for eighteen months:
it has practically never been off the bestseller lists, . . . And
all that without any help from the press: three reviews altogether,
. . . An entertaining story, a sober but irreproachable style, a
message that is both anti-conformist and profound: nothing more
was needed . . .”
– François Busnel, L'Express (Paris)

“Full of wisdom and irony, with a shot of heart's blood and
a drop of melancholy added. A tribute to women as well as the portrait
of an age which has been irrevocably lost. A book that caresses
the heart and soul, without ever becoming sentimental.”
– Bernd Lubowski, Berliner Morgenpost (Berlin)

“The renunciation of girlish romance alone couldn't explain
the outstanding success of this erotic Bildingsroman, which is not
only a best-seller but a long-seller. Vizinczey is a powerful storyteller
and a master of his adopted tongue – as we know from An Innocent
Millionaire. (We owe the scathing portrayal of New York attorneys
in that novel to the seven-year lawsuit the author had to wage in
New York for the rights to In Praise of Older Women.) András
Vajda's tenderly discreet memoirs already have all the virtues of
the later novel.”
– Martin Halter, Berliner Zeitung (Berlin)

“Because of the author's strict Catholic upbringing, everything
that happens has the added excitement of the forbidden . . . the
exaltation that is aroused by the slightest detail of the other's
body rises to a liturgical intensity.”
– Werner Spies, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

“From the very beginning, In Praise of Older Women seemed
to belong among the classics.”
– Günter Fischer, Münchner Stadtzeitung
(Munich)

“One of the most readable, most entertaining, wisest books
of world literature.”
– Arno Widmann, Perlentaucher de Kultur und Literatur
(Berlin)

“This novel is so refreshing, so relaxing, so entertaining
and so subtle that it has rightfully conquered a great public once
again . . . This discreet writer, in the line of descent from Stendhal,
incidentally settles accounts with the totalitarianisms of the 20th
century, which gives the novel its scope as a work of heroic melancholy.”
– Ijoma Mangold, Süddeutsche Zeitung (Munich)

“A masterpiece of European wisdom and humor, which needed
the New World to blossom in all its lightness.” – Alberto
Bevilacqua, Grazia (Milan)

“Vizinczey has written a novel which in readability, gaiety,
fascination, in its power to touch and enthrall the reader, far
surpasses all the indigestible volumes of experimental writing.”
– Martin Ros, Vrij Nederland (Amsterdam)

“Erotic situations, games, frustrations, naive miscalculations,
humiliations, gaiety and tears of pleasure . . . Vizinczey never
exaggerates, he writes with clear detachment not devoid of irony:
his graceful and evocative style frees us from the fear that so
often accompanies love. A little masterpiece of impeccable style,
verging on the classical, sensitive, graceful and suggestive."
– Maria Dols, Ajoblanco (Barcelona)

“Humor and absolute naturalness. Vizinczey's knowledge extends
to all fields, including the literary one, and is reflected in the
absolute efficacy of the narration, whose . . . essential humor
is equivalent to the naturalness of the naked body. . . .
The novel has a dynamism which is defined by one of its own sentences:
'Haven't you heard of Einstein's theory? Pleasure turns into energy.'
"
– Clara Janés, El País (Madrid)

“The charm of the sexual adventures of young András
with middle-aged women arises from the joyous originality and humor
with which this young man abandons himself to his experiences. In
this novel of apprenticeship, the explicitness is informed not by
sensationalism but by intelligence." – J. A. Ugalde,
El Pais (Madrid)

“. . . a literary work of the first order." – La
Gaceta

“An erotic classic of the most subtle complexity, filled with
humor and wit. An invitation to the experiences of love and adventure.
But it is also the portrait of someone who is familiar to us from
family stories, someone whom we have all known at one time or another.
No doubt the great success of the book is owing to this, but also
to its style, so unaffected, so natural and at the same time so
perfectly exact."
– Menene Gras Balaguer, La Vanguardia (Barcelona)

“Acquires its vigor and naturalness from an ironic, subtle
and penetrating introspection and an incisive critical sense. .
. . An irresistible inventory of erotic experiences that evokes
the charm and intensity of an erotic tradition which has survived
the nightmares of history.”
– Ulises Paramo, Revista Impacto (Mexico City)

“A funny novel about sex, or rather (which is rarer) a novel
which is funny – as well as touching – about sex . .
. Elegant, exact and melodious – has style and presence and
individuality." – Isabel Quigly, Sunday Telegraph
(London)

“The extraordinary situation of the young András, and
his combination of innocence and premature knowledge, allow Stephen
Vizinczey to keep up a cutting and ironical commentary on human
pretension and frailty, while giving a sharply etched picture of
the disintegration of European society in the last years of the
war."
– The Times Literary Supplement (London)

“In Praise of Older Women has now the undisputed status of
a modern erotic classic." – Harry Reid, The Herald (Glasgow)

“The gracefully written story of a young man growing up among
older women. . . . Although some passages may well arouse the reader,
this novel brims with what the courts have termed "redeeming
literary merit." – Clarence Petersen, Chicago Tribune

“It is a gem of subtlety and nuance about the discovery of
sexuality . . . I have still not got over it. Read it!" –
Danielle Laurin, Elle

“A pleasure, a brilliant first novel . . . Vizinczey writes
of women with sympathy, tact and delight, and he writes about sex
with more lucidity and grace than most writers ever acquire."
– Larry McMurtry, Houston Post

“Love and women are so exciting and agreeable to András
Vajda that he is ungrudgingly grateful and pays discriminating attention
. . . András' life is not an easy one, either with the women
he loves or in the track of the juggernaut of history, from World
War II to the Hungarian uprising. As a social historian, Vizinczey
succeeds both in suggesting the dimensions of these public catastrophes
and in demonstrating their irrelevance to the hero's life . . .
Extraordinary in its modesty and buoyancy, its fearlessness and
persistent unemphasized sadness. It comes to the boundaries of life
but only after alert and energetic explorations. . . . It is neither
indignant nor compassionate. . . It is a good novel."
– Marvin Mudrick, Hudson Review (New York)

“Conveys much of the warmth and understanding that seem more
common between the sheets than between the covers of novels . .
. falls like an antidote into our youth-obsessed society . . . delightfully
charming, richly ironic . . . a fresh breeze blowing through our
libraries overloaded with neurotic works."
– Library Journal (New York)

“A rarity – an erotic novel in which sexual experience
is not a torment, a novel which affirms its pleasures and joys in
a style that the author keeps from ever getting inflated."
– Max Lerner, New York Post

“The delicious adventures of a young Casanova who appreciates
maturity while acquiring it himself." – Polly Devlin,
Vogue

“The entire book is permeated with a feeling of reality. .
. . Every erotic episode is unique and interesting." –
Day Thorpe, The Sunday Star (Washington)

“Like James Joyce . . . Vizinczey has a refreshing message
to deliver: life is not about sex, sex is about life." –
John Podhoretz, The Washington Times

An Excerpt from

To Young Men Without Lovers

“In all your amours you should prefer old women to young ones ...
because they have greater knowledge of the world.”
- Benjamin Franklin

This book is addressed to young men and dedicated to older women – and the connection between the two is my proposition. I'm not an expert on sex, but I was a good student of the women I loved, and I'll try to recall those happy and unhappy experiences which, I believe, made a man out of me.

I spent my first twenty-three years in Hungary, Austria and Italy and my adventures in growing up differed considerably from the adventures of young men in the New World. Their dreams and opportunities are influenced by dissimilar amorous conventions. I am a European, they are Americans; and what makes for an even greater difference, they are young today, I was young a long time ago. Everything has changed, even the guiding myths. Modern culture – American culture – glorifies the young; on the lost continent of old Europe it was the affair of the young man and his older mistress that had the glamour of perfection. Today young men believe in girls of their own age, convinced that they alone have anything worthwhile to offer; we tended to value continuity and tradition and sought to enrich ourselves with the wisdom and sensibility of the past.

And sex was only part of it. We came from large families and were used to getting along with people older than ourselves. When I was a small boy my grandparents, who lived on a farm near Lake Balaton, used to give a lunch party every summer attended by more than two hundred relatives. I remember marveling how many of us there were, sitting on long benches at long tables in the courtyard, between the house and the plum trees – rows and rows of aunts and uncles, cousins, in-laws, ranging from children to octogenarians. Members of such tribes knew no age barriers. We lived within a hundred miles of each other and we all loved the same songs.

The storm of war swept that courtyard clear. The Vajdas, once so close, now live on four continents. We are losing touch, like everybody else. America wasn't devastated by foreign armies, but the leafy courtyards are gone just the same. They were paved over for runways. Families fly apart, and each generation seems to belong to a different period of history. The big houses with room for grandparents, aunts and uncles are replaced by teenage hangouts, retirement homes and the quiet apartments of the middle-aged. Opportunities for young men to mingle with older women have greatly diminished. They don't have much faith in each other.

As I was lucky enough to grow up in what was still an integrated society, I have the extravagant notion that my recollections may bring about a better understanding of the truth that men and women have a great deal in common even if they were born years apart – and may thereby stimulate a broader intercourse between the generations.

As I'm going to describe my own experiences, I ought to reassure the reader that I don't intend to overwhelm him with my personal history. It is his curiosity about himself that I hope to stimulate. What follows is a highly selective memoir centered not so much on the personality of the narrator as on the universal predicaments of love. Still, to the extent that this book is an autobiography, I am conscious, like Thurber, of Benvenuto Cellini's stern dictum that a man should be at least forty years old and have accomplished something of excellence before setting down the story of his life. I don't fulfill either of these conditions. But, as Thurber says, 'Nowadays, nobody who has a typewriter pays any attention to the old master's quaint rules.'